To think this person should be in jail?

[FerdinandsMassiveBollocks]

www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/female-transsexual-walks-free-court-8546941

Anyone else not comfortable with this being counted as a crime committed by a woman? And really not comfortable with this person not going to jail? I don't care if there are no female specific classes, (there is a reason for that btw, because women don't do this shit) this person was male enough to commit the crime they are male enough to go to men's prison.

Nanunanu Females are born with self lubricating vaginas and this stays with them throughout their lives; some female babies have a discharge of blood, both mine did. Menopausal women take a while longer to lubricate, but they still lubricate if the desire and response is there. Women who are raped will not lubricate.

Some women have no choice in removal of uterus, cervix, fallopian tubes and ovaries due to cancer. The same applies to breasts re cancer. They are still women. Not trans women or trans men.

XY females are rare and they have vestiges of female reproductive organs. They are raised as females and the majority are happy in this role.

There is no such thing as being born with internalised gender. Gender is a social construct.

There is no one on this planet who can create a vagina. Just like no one can create other body parts.

nanunanu,
I would never seek to define your 'womanhood' by any of your biological organs or discuss your personality and sense of self as being in any way defined by your vagina, or indeed your spleen or anything else. That is very much the antithesis of what I was saying!

What I was trying to get across was there is a reality of phenotypic sex expression eg there is a biological set of markers that allow people to be ascribed to the female sex, eg the approximate half of our sexually dimorphic species who are likely to produce ova and carry out the process of reproduction. This is something recognised at birth in most cases and the baby is declared female, no matter what concealed anomalies of development, hormones and fertility might be present, and no matter what course in life they chart in terms of surgery etc.
And as a person identified as female at birth, a whole host of assumptions, expectations and social gender roles are then imposed on top of it, culturally dependant but in many ways to the detriment of the individual.

Oddly enough I have a huge sympathy with anyone who feels their 'gender' and socialisation limits and does not define them I feel like this myself! But I cannot support the solution that biology requires redefining, and would rather support people challenging gendered behavioural and social expectations than pretend that surgical/hormonal alteration of phenotypic appearance is somehow an exact equivalence of this biology.

elendon Some women who are raped will lubricate. Some will orgasm. By no means all. But some do.

Your second paragraph I agree with entirely. Having previously declared no pastry in the bun fight I was trying to work out why previous posters vehemence that gender was solely dependant upon genitalia rubbed me up the wrong way. My sister has a condition where her vagina is closing and it's lubrication is crap. She is not any less of a woman for it. But according to some posters on here she is not truly woman.

Xy women have vestiges of male sex organs not female. They are only externally female.

If gender is solely a social construct, what does it matter if someone changes their anatomy to match their social construct? It hurts me in no way for them to do so.

Noone on here has argued the sentence was appropriate for the crime reported. But some of the anger that has been directed at all trans women based on the actions of this one abhorent person is unfair.

Didactylos I too would rather that. And fear that on a population basis the idea that to match the social construct you have to alter your anatomy is setting back feminism. Within the lesbian community their is an increasing dearth of butch identity as many of the younger butches are transitioning instead of remaining masculine women.

But on an individual level those who have to live in our (very) imperfect world, dysphoric that their body doesn't match their social construct..... how can we justify forcing them to remain dysphoric when there is an option?

Population basis yes I agree with you. But taken for each individual? I'll listen to hir distress.

Sex abuse is sex abuse. He/she/it should go to jail. There have been other transexuals sent to jail in the UK, I'm sure - they are sent to jails appropriate to their birth gender.

Very few sex abusers are female, and most of them are in cahoots with one or more men - but it is a proven fact that abusers continue to abuse. `it wouldn't surprise me if this individual continues to prey on children, especially if there are no repercussions.

so why do we prioritise certain feelings of dysphoria over others

why do we treat trans gender identity with validation, medication and surgery, while those who identify as trans abled are not assisted in surgical alterations so they can live in with the body they identify with?
Why don't we assist those who feel trans racial (eg Rachel Dolezal) or trans species with their chosen transition and agree that the important thing is the individual is true to themself?

Are there people who are transabled or trans species?

There isn't really a satisfactory option though. Not everyone accepts the identity trans people personally have of themselves as in every way the same as the opposite sex. Where their identity, feelings and needs don't concern me I will keep quiet out of politeness and compassion, but where they clash with my rights as a woman I will not. And don't expect me to.

Yes, there are, Nanu.

here is an example of a trans abled person (who also is trans gender). This person got a disabled badge from a doctor despite being a fake paraplegic who goes mountain hiking in their spare time. It's batshit that these delusions are being entertained

Perhaps trans abled people ought to be able to compete in the Paralympics.

But according to some posters on here she is not truly woman

You have massively misunderstood to be honest. Your sister is of the sex that can produce eggs and bear offspring. She's female and a woman. Not more or less than any other woman. Having anomalies or flaws with female parts doesn't stop a woman from being a woman.

People changing their external appearance to match the gender role they want to be is fine. A ok. Where it becomes not ok is when the belief that changing your external appearance makes you literally the opposite sex becomes mainstream and enshrined in law. This leads to trans women with penises being entitled to enter rape crisis shelters and domestic violence shelters, women's rite sporting events and many other scenarios where women lose out to males who believe that having surgically created vaginas and breasts and taking synthetic female hormones means they are the same as females who have been raised as girls and women in our society. That is not cool.

I was trying to work out why previous posters vehemence that gender was solely dependant upon genitalia

I don't think anyone has said that. A person's sex is determined by genitalia etc. A physical, quantitative fact, that cannot be changed.

Well you live and learn learning. There are some very strange folk in the world.

There are some very strange folk in the world.

That's a very trans-abled-phobic statement...

As for trans species, yes it's a real thing
www.vice.com/read/what-does-it-mean-to-be-trans-species

But on an individual level those who have to live in our (very) imperfect world, dysphoric that their body doesn't match their social construct..... how can we justify forcing them to remain dysphoric when there is an option?

So then Nanu, how can you justify forcing the trans specied and trans abled and trans racial to remain dysphoric when there is an option? Of course we should all indulge these delusions to make them feel better and included at all times. And of course the trans abled should be allowed to compete with the disabled in the Paralympics and the trans racial should be eligible to represent BAME societies in universities. It doesn't hurt anyone, does it? It doesn't affect us so why would anyone not want to accommodate them? Have a little compassion for someone more oppressed than you.

Nanunanu nobody is "forcing them to remain dysphoric". I personally am happy for anyone to present however they please, modify their bodies however they please, call themselves whatever they please. (Though dysphoria does not happen without social context, and that for many people there are other options for treatment for something that causes them such distress.)

But the freedom for someone else to punch their fist stops at the end of my nose: when people born male, with male privilege and male bodies force themselves into women's space, causing women harm, then that's the point I will push back. How can you justify forcing women to give up privacy, safety, and access to public life, when there are other options?

I am not a member of the groups affected by transabled or transracial people. Race is more complex than almost anything else in human history and I would leave it to individual bame groups to decide if they would allow a transracial person to be a member.

Wrt competing in the paralympics: if a transabled person wanted to compete they would have to go a little further than sitting in a chair. The admission rules are strict and clear they would have to be disabled not simply perceive themselves to be so. So that person wishing to have a spinal injury would need to have one to be allowed to even attempt to enter (and if he can find a surgeon somewhere in the world to perform it it would be safer than attempting it himself). I doubt he'd be fit enough to compete. I know a paralympian coach and even as a coach he is supremely fit. The athletes themselves must be astonishingly so. Degrees of disability are accommodated, perhaps one day there will be a transabled event. But not yet.

Thank you for opening my eyes to other ways of living. None if them would be my personal choice, and yes my immediate emotional response is that of otherness and strangeness. The world is a wonderfully odd place. I wonder if my emotional response will soften in the way that it has to transgendered people or if i will always remain transabled-phobic.

I remain a little racist despite efforts to not be so. I remain a little misogynistic and misandric despite efforts not to be so. And I remain a little transphobic despite efforts not to be so.

I see the analogy you are making. That the transabled person is merely pretending to be disabled. That they can get up and walk away without ever truly experiencing what it is to be disabled because even if they never actually do so, they know it remains an option. And so too can pre-op (and to a lesser degree post op) trans* people walk away from their assumed gender. I'll think on it. I don't think i'll change my view, but it deserves thought.

What woman have I forced to give up access to public life or safety or privacy annie?

Nanu There are some very strange folk in the world
well, quite

but all of these individuals: trans racial, trans abled, trans species, even those who identify as trans age in some way eg the trans woman Stephonknee Wolshct and others who similarly identify as children apparently feel and know their identity in the same way as a trans gender individual does. So should we encourage, validate and accept these identities in exactly the same way? provide them surgery to alter their bodies eg disable them or add animal prostheses. Should we encourage a trans disabled person to take up the support services and resources provided to those with a physical disablility, despite being able bodied? Does Rachel Dolezal have a right to be a spokesperson for NAACP and represent the black community? Should we welcome Stephonknee into school and soft play environments as a 6 year old girl tragically trapped in the body of a middle aged man?

these are pretty extreme examples but as you said upthread: Who are we to deny the truth of their lives?

its probably easier to see the possible problems with assisting physical and social tranitions in these other cases: because the identity and rights of the group that would be expected to accept these transitioning individuals has a sharp contrast and is somehow clearer:
we see that expecting a class of small schoolgirls to accept Stephonknee as one of them is likely to impact on them,
we see that able bodied people using the limited physical, financial and environmental resources dedicated to physically disabled people is an injustice to them
we feel disturbed that Rachel Dolezal can make use of scholarships and become a spokesperson for a group without actually sharing any of the historical and socioeconomic oppression they have experienced, and in doing so has prevented a person who is a member of the community she identifies with from fulfilling these roles

So can you see why some women might have a problem accepting trans women as exactly the same as them when it has a possibly negative impact on them eg in the use of resources, changes to sex segregated spaces, policing of language and discussion topics related to female sex and social issues?
The difference is we are not telling disabled people to accept an able bodied man in a wheelchair occupying one of the limited accessible parts of public transport, and we are not castigating the black community for standing up and saying 'How can Rachel Dolezal presume to speak for us when she does not share our experience socialisation and history'. And 6 year old schoolgirls are not being called transphobic and being expected to budge up and make lots of room for Stephonknee in their classroom.
So why is it acceptable to demand a level of understanding and acceptance from women, in many ways to their detriment, that no other group would be expected to comply with?

Nanunanu you are arguing that women should be forced to give up safety, privacy and the ability to take part in public life when you argue that there should be no sex-segregated spaces, and that male bodied, male socialised people should have free access to women-only spaces.

Didactylos apologies i wrote a reply and the internet ate it. I shall try to recreate it tomorrow when i am less sleepy.

How's that annie? How are women prohibited from taking part in public life if there are no sex segregated areas? How am I forcing them to give up their safety?

The only people who have ever hurt or assaulted me are women. And actually in sex segregated areas so public toilets and single sex educational environment. They are not safe places.

Nanunanu as ridiculous as this seems now, one of the many early arguments against women in Parliament was that there weren't any toilets they could use.

Crudely put: if there is nowhere even nominally safe that I can go to the loo when I am out, then I am restricted to where I can go. If I cannot go to the swimming pool or gym because I will be forced to share changing rooms with people with penises, then I cannot swim or use the gym. If I cannot send my daughters to a school trip because they will be sharing bedrooms with teenage male-bodied people, then they will be excluded from a part of school life. And so on and so forth.

(I don't have daughters, I have a son, but I have already had to persuade one other mum I know - against my better judgement - not to withdraw her incredibly bright daughter from school because there are no girl's loos, only gender-neutral ones. In this case I think the loos are OK as they are specially-designed single stalls off a common corridor, but if they were old-style loos where there are single stalls in an enclosed room with one entrance/exit, and it would be easy to be trapped, I would have to have agreed with her.)

I am sorry that women hurt you. Nobody should be hurt by anyone. However, you are the outlier - violence is perpetrated, overwhelmingly, by men, and most violence against women is overwhelmingly perpetrated by men.

You are right that nowhere is a "safe space" - not at home, not in public. But there are degrees of safety, and ways in which women navigate the world knowing they are at risk. And women are now being constantly told that - against all their life experience and knowledge of the world - their fears about being trapped in intimate circumstances with male-bodied people are silly and irrational, and that they should accept that and shut up. Consider, for example, the posters in women's loos in universities that say "If you are in a public bathroom and see a stranger whose gender does not match the sign on the door, follow these steps: 1) don't worry, they know better than you." This is explicitly telling women not to trust themselves, that they should not ever raise the alarm about someone obviously male in a woman's bathroom or other intimate space, in case they inadvertently hurt someone else's feelings. This is what women have been told from time immemorial: that male feelings are more important than women's safety.

am not a member of the groups affected by transabled or transracial people. Race is more complex than almost anything else in human history and I would leave it to individual bame groups to decide if they would allow a transracial person to be a member

But you are not leaving it to women to say they don't want trans people? There's a massive surprise. The entire left is full of men who are happy to tell women when they should accept dick.

There is some very eloquent writing on this thread